


Love Like A Man

by sherlck (scienceofdeducjohn)



Category: Falsettos - Lapine/Finn
Genre: Character Study, Fluff, Hurt/Comfort, M/M, Marvin comforting Whizzer, Trans Male Character, Trans Whizzer Brown, they love each other so so much, trans!whizzer
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-03-24
Updated: 2019-03-24
Packaged: 2019-11-29 12:17:25
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,586
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18223049
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/scienceofdeducjohn/pseuds/sherlck
Summary: Whizzer hadn’t always known he was trans. It had been a gradual but inevitable process, one in which he'd learned to love himself unconditionally. Sometimes, though, he can't help the regret he feels at starting his journey a little bit late. But then there's Marvin, holding him, kissing him, loving him despite all that. Or rather, loving himforit.





	Love Like A Man

**Author's Note:**

> Hey guys, I needed some more trans Whizzer content so I wrote it! A little disclaimer: this is all based on my personal experience of gender dysphoria. I'm definitely not implying that his story is a universal one nor do I in any way want to ridicule other trans stories. Everyone's journey is unique and valid! Basically I'm just here to share my personal headcanons :)
> 
> Anyway, hope you enjoy!
> 
> Title is taken from Body by Syml:  
>  _I want to love like a man  
>  I’ll build you a home when I can  
> Give my new body a chance  
> Patient now it’s all that I have  
> I fought the world for your hand  
> I fought the world for your hand  
> Give my new body a chance  
> Give my new body a chance_

Whizzer hadn’t always known he was trans. That wasn’t to say he had always been comfortable with himself and his body until he suddenly wasn’t. No, the discomfort had been a constant companion in his life. Rather, it had been the realization that said discomfort didn’t have to be the necessary evil he used to take it for. That instead of being an integral part of the abstract concept of “womanhood” (which, he supposed, he had always felt so devastatingly disconnected from anyway), it could be discarded in some way to make room for contentment. _That_ was what had taken its sweet time to settle into his stubborn brain. Maybe that was why he had been no less than twenty years old when he finally reached the inevitable conclusion. Often he wished for the clarity described by some of his trans friends, the classic “ _always hung out with guys, always wore my brother’s hand-me-downs, always knew, somehow, deep down_ ”. Whizzer didn’t have a brother whose clothes he could try on, nor did he only have male friends. He wasn’t straight and he didn’t hate barbies or the colour pink. In other words, he didn’t fit the stereotype that he believed as a child to entail being trans. For him, being trans had been a quiet stirring tucked deep inside his chest where his dysphoria lived, one that grew louder and louder as he became increasingly aware of himself and his friends and classmates and the glaring differences between them.

He’d agonize over the sense of discrepancy he felt between himself and the world’s view of him, and he’d chalk it up to puberty and sexism. Sometimes though, he’d give into his curiosity and he’d sit down at his desk late at night. His parents would have long since gone to bed, and he’d resolutely ignore the clock in the bottom corner of his screen, focusing instead on mustering up the courage to type in a simple Google search. All under the guise of pure intellectual interest of course; just for his own personal education. One night when he was eighteen and a half years old he’d stumbled onto a personal blog by a transgender author named William. This author had posted graphic pictures of his body, taken along the entirety of his journey that Whizzer quickly scrolled past, feeling like he was seeing things that were not meant for his eyes. They were too _much_ at once, too confrontational in a way he didn’t want to analyse. But what he would allow himself to look at were texts that he soon realized were diary entries, stories of discovery which sounded terrifyingly much like his most secret thoughts, the ones he’d never said aloud, never even allowed himself to think beyond a certain point. He remembered how he’d held his breath as he saw conclusions being drawn that were based on experiences eerily similar to his own, on feelings of shame and disgust and the occasional euphoria. He’d stayed up until 3am that night peering at the words until his eyes burned, yet he hadn’t been able to fall asleep until 5. And when he finally had, he’d woken up feeling frustratingly much like the same person. Things like this would happen roughly once a month and with increasing frequency until he cut himself off one day, from then on reluctantly forcing his laptop closed at the more sensible hour of 12am every night for fear of what else he would find out.

Of course when he looked back on that time now, he would say how stupid he’d been that he hadn’t realized. Marvin would smile his softest smile at him then, and rub his thigh or kiss his cheek in that way that meant _You know I love you, but you’re being an idiot right now_. Whizzer would feel a little better then. Most of the time. But the regret would never fade; there was too much time he’d missed out on, too much time wasted by not doing the only thing that could have ever made him happy.

Because suddenly, it had been his twentieth birthday, and he’d wasted two decades of his life being scared and he was almost legally allowed to do all the things an adult could do, and when he looked at his friends he saw people halfway through college, people starting their careers, people doing the things they’d dreamed of since they were ten years old and his grandma would tell him “ _These are the best years of your life, Liz. You’ve got so many amazing opportunities, so many experiences ahead, and it’s all handed to you on a golden platter_.” (Except it _wasn’t_ really, was it?.) He would plaster an empty grin on his face and nod, not even knowing where to begin.

Maybe that was why he never did.

So then he was twenty years old. And in college, taking photography and baseball courses. And going to parties (not in dresses anymore, like he used to five years ago), and kissing boys and sometimes girls (though he would quickly give up on the latter). He was going to the women’s restroom where women would come in and frown briefly at his cropped hair and men’s shirts that he’d snagged from the second hand store, and come back in again ten seconds later (still frowning). And of course he was going home to his shitty shared apartment where he would sit down at his desk and open his laptop and take a deep breath and open up Google again. The only difference now was that he’d finally begun considering, honestly, whether he might be transgender.

He didn’t talk to his parents about his gender therapist until she finally, _finally_ gave him the go-ahead for hormone replacement therapy. When the doctor gave him his first shot he had to bite his tongue to keep from grinning so wide he felt like an idiot. He’d never forget that moment. By the time she gave him the discrete white cardboard box, though, his hands were shaking, twisting and turning it over and over; it had been weird to think that this bland box contained the beginning of the rest of his life. At home, he’d set it down on his desk and let himself fall face-down onto his bed, squeezing his eyes shut as he willed the tears to stop. Because starting medication meant telling his parents, hell, meant telling _everyone_ around him, and sooner rather than later.

“You’re crying.” Whizzer suddenly hears Marvin murmur beside him.

Whizzer hastily wipes away the tears, turning on his side so they’re facing each other in their bed. “I thought you were asleep.” He’s surprised when his voice comes out rough; he supposes he’s been crying for a while, then.

“I woke up.” Marvin’s left hand brushes his cheek along the trail left by the tears. “Why were you crying?”

Whizzer tries to give him his most reassuring smile, but feels it grow crooked as he explains, “I was thinking about how different my life was sixteen years ago. And… How I wish it hadn’t been.”

Something in Marvin’s eyes breaks, but he doesn’t say anything. He just shifts closer so that he can kiss him gently on the lips. “I love you.” He whispers against his skin, and Whizzer lets out a shuddering breath. Marvin moves to plant kisses on his cheek, his neck, all the way down to his scars. “Every part of you.”

He’d been twenty-five, a bachelor’s degree richer and a set of loving parents fewer, when he’d had top surgery. It had felt like nothing he could have ever imagined to wake up and look down at his flat (albeit bandaged) chest. He’d cried and his friends had cried when they saw him cry and they’d hugged him (carefully) and then he’d cried some more. After that he slowly started learning to love his body, and he started working out even more than he had during the weeks leading up to the surgery. He became addicted to striving for his ideal body because for the first time in his life, it was actually within reach. Seeing himself in his bathroom mirror became euphoric instead of dysphoric. He would look at his broadening shoulders and his chest and his waist and he would grin at himself, not even thinking about being embarrassed anymore. He still did that sometimes, and he still didn’t care, not even whenever Marvin caught him, rolling his eyes with a knowing smirk. At moments like those, pride would fill him up to the point he felt like he could float away on a cloud of euphoric bliss. In his more rare moments of weakness though, he would feel that familiar dark regret of losing his parents and so many years of life as his true self seeping in through the cracks of his carefully built-up body.

But Marvin, like always, manages to pull him out of his self-pity and back to the present. Back to him. “You know that, don’t you?” The concern written in his furrowed brow and his stern eyes make Whizzer swallow against the lump in his throat.

“I know.” He kisses him, and he feels an affectionate smile tugging at the corners of his mouth. “I love you, too.”

Whizzer hadn’t always known he was trans. It had been a long and tiring journey. But, he thought, as he lay here in the arms of his boyfriend, he’d reached the perfect destination.

**Author's Note:**

> Please don't hesitate to comment with your thoughts and/or to let me know if you liked it!  
> You can also find me on tumblr @scienceofdeducjohn :)


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